The Irish standard., 1887-06-18
A LIFE OF ADVENTURE.
Incidents in the Life Of Edmund O'Don-
evan, the Celebrated Irish War
Correspondent.
HE WAS A PATRIOTIC IRISHMAN
The Death Of this Brave Man on tn
Sandy Desert Of the Land
Of the Pharaohs.
fKansas City .Iimes.)

{Kansas City Times.)
Edmund O'Donoyan is the name OF
an Irish journalist who made himself
famous. 4 little thin stirred Of a life OF
him has just been published in Eng
land, not greater than seventy or eighty
pages, perhaps, when it might well
have gone to five hundred.
His father was q learned professor in
the university Of Dublin. Devoted to
his work there he permitted his eldest
born, Edmund, to do pretty much as he
pleased, and he pleased To become q sur
geon. After q little practice in this
line it further pleased him to become q
botanist and geclogist. Then he tray
elled. Then he began q life of adven-
ture, which in many ways was one OF
the most adventurous lives that ever
had All abiding place i'll the realms of
either truth. romance or fiction.
Irishman born, bred, and educated,
he was among the very first to esponse
the Fenian cause, and give to it youth.
energy, daring, enthusiasm, and devo-
Jion. He mastered the military tactics
ofthe text books that he might become
dri}l-sergeant. He was rarely gifted
by nature to be both orator and
agitatvr, and he was both at a
ga]lop. lie enlisted recruits, organized
them, drilled them when be could in
some barn, or some lonely hillside, III
some isolated glen. When the drilling
was done the exhortations would be-
gin. aud these went home to the hearts
Of his young lrishmen ready TO follow
their young drill master to war or the
scahold.
James Stevens, the great head, front
and leader of The Fenian movement.
was his lifelong guide. counselor and
friend. One day The British authcri-
ties laid hold upon Stevens and made
him fast j1l tie dungeon Of q Dublin
prison. They could not or did not
keep him. for he soon broke out and
fed to France. O'Donovan quickly
followed after, Joining him in Paris.
There with tongue, pen and purse he
wrought splendid]y for his chief and
for the cause Of Ireland so deaI to his
heart.
The Franco Prussian war came on,
and gave him the opportunity so long
beseeched for, the opportunity to make
his first essay in arms. He joined g
French regiment of the line as a private
soldier, fought as became his race,
was named captain on the field Of
battle for heroic deeds, was shot 2own,
captured. locked up in a German fort
ress, escaped through the sheer pity if
not a tenderer sentiment Of the gaoler's
daughter, and got safely home once
more to Ireland.
The Carlists were next to breaE loose
among the hills Of Spain, and th1ther
rushed O'Donovan rs a correspondent
for the London News. Somewhat OF a
guerrilla. much Of q Journalist and a
passab]e artist, he sought, wrote and
sketched until his reputation became
European. Meanwhile he had learned
to speak French, Spanish and German.
Afterward he added TO these Turkish,
Russian and Arabic. and two or three
dialects for especial use among the
Tekkes and Tugcomans of Tartary.
Admirable polyglot, was there ever
known in all newspaper history before
or since a journalist SO thoroughly
equipped for war by land or sea. among
the Arabs or the Cossacks, by the blue
Bosphorous, or where, God willing. old
Mazeppa,'s steeds tomorrow